173. Serac Alone

[Designation: CROZIER]

[Instrument Class: PRIMAL]

[Anchored Realm: TIDEREIGN (+2)]

[Item Description: To take up the shepherd's crook is in itself an act of affirmation. Commitment to a cause and to all the souls who live and die by it. But how far one takes that commitment is another matter entirely. Some may be content to be but their people's constant friend and safekeeper. While others may turn the chase on its head, to stalk the edges of twilight so intimately that they themselves become a huntsman of the night.]

***

Serac's first sight of the world of Day condensed into that of its first local guide. Travertine aft'Nankervis did cut a formidable figure, enough to justify the weight of his responsibility as well as the length of his name.

Where Bea the Seersmith had been built like a boulder, Travertine the VOIDLING-smiter was a sturdy oak tree. Beneath a towering set of antlers hung an angular face with stern stag eyes, all sitting atop a muscular neck thick enough to support the whole contraption. The rest of him was garbed in a curious ensemble that couldn't decide whether to be a hunting suit or a ceremonial robe.

His CROZIER, as its name suggested, was a shepherd's crook of solid, well-worn oak. Unlike its namesake, however, it lacked any frills or gildings, sharing its modesty with many a Pathsight-designated Instrument.

The man was flanked on either side by a pair of definitely-just-deer. One was small and dainty, the other big and bristling, and both very much antlered. According to Pathsight, Little Doe was DLEE and Big Stag ORD. Together, they made up Travertine's Oathborn tag team.

"Your familiars," Serac voiced her curiosity as she pulled herself back onto her feet, "do they always stay by your side like that? Beautiful creatures, by the way—you must be very proud."

It hadn't been her intention, but Serac's comment appeared to catch Travertine off guard. The deerherd's severe expression momentarily softened into an almost-smile as he gave his reply.

"They were already my companions before my transmutation," he explained in a deep baritone not too far removed from the Frenzy-distorted version of his voice. "When I became a Wayfarer, DLEE and ORD decided to walk the Path alongside me. Bindings of this nature are more common than you might imagine, here in Tidereign."

"Neat!" Serac enthused with a smile, genuinely delighted by the notion. "Speaking of, did you manage to catch what my familiar looked like? It's just I haven't really 'met' it yet, and if I'm understanding its description correctly, it won't come back to me until the next cycle."

Travertine considered for a moment, his almost-a-smile re-hardening into his default scowl.

"Sadly, you'll have to wait longer and see for yourself," he said. "To me, it looked to be a maceman of unremarkable stature and shadows for limbs. But Breachspawns are unreliable indicators of the Oathborn's true appearance. Do not let my words prejudice you against your own familiar."

But that's exactly what I saw too! I assumed that's just how everything looks in Frenzy, but maybe there's more to this than I'd thought…

"Good to know," Serac said aloud. She then remembered a point of contention from their earlier, one-sided conversation. "I think you also said it shouldn't be 'possible' for that Breachspawn to have been mine. Why? Would you have expected something different?"

Travertine changed his expression again, but only to deepen his unfriendly scowl.

"Tell me, outrealmer," he asked by way of answer, "did you arrive in Tidereign already breached? Or is this your second Day with us?"

It was Serac's turn to frown, failing to see the line of questioning. "No, it's my first Day after my first Night. Er, last night—is that what I should call it?—I breached my [Oath] in the last minute and didn't have enough time to reaffirm it."

For all his rigid sternness, Travertine proved a rather expressive fellow in his own way. This time, his slitted stag eyes widened slightly in obvious surprise.

"Remarkable," he remarked, though sounding not at all moved. "Perhaps it's a quirk of you being an outrealmer, but what you just described should be impossible. For we Day-living souls are just that: creatures of Day and nothing else. The only aspect of us that can and must cross the divide is our Breachspawn. A calamity we strive to avoid at all costs. That you managed to follow your Breachspawn across the veils and witness said calamity yourself is quite literally unheard of. I suggest, both for your sake and ours, that you keep what happened here to yourself."

Serac's head, already spinning for the better part of an hour, was now close to exploding. There's a lot that didn't get covered in the tutorial! But she couldn't rightly blame Bea, what with the Seersmith being an Anchored soul and a long-time expat besides.

"Hang on," Serac now said with rising alarm, having caught the most ominous implication behind Travertine's spiel, "what does that mean for Zacko and Renna? You didn't happen to see a Manusya and a Yaksha on your way here, did you?"

"Three outrealmers?" Travertine gave a baritone rendition of the same reaction as Oriole the tabbycat. "From three different Realms—including a Manusya, did you say? You keep some strange company, Serac Edin, and no, I can't say I've seen them. To my knowledge, you're the first and only outrealmer in living memory to have visited our part of Mount Meru."

Serac's face fell in an instant. It was confirmation of what she'd already feared. That she alone among the Upheavers trio had made the Night-into-Day crossing.

"Does that mean my friends are still stuck on the side of Night?" she wondered aloud, not truly expecting an answer. "Could they also find their way across, do you think? Or maybe I could go back to them? Will I ever see them ag—?"

Travertine silenced her with a hand, every bit as stern as his face. "I'm not the right Mriga for you to direct such questions, but the Keeper willing, I could introduce you to one who may fare better than I. Come, let us depart presently. And"—the deer man directed his scowl onto the Rakshasa's head—"let's see if we can't do something about your unsightly horns."

Serac had to do a double take. Up until now, Travertine aft'Nankervis had been polite enough if a little stilted. This gibe about her poor horns (both broken at the base) felt rather forward if not downright mean-spirited.

But the man himself seemed to think nothing of it, turning without another word to make his way down a footpath. His crook clacked against the packed earth and his deer companions followed close behind. Perhaps he also meant nothing by it. Serac, at least for now, was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

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Shifting her attention onto her now fully revealed surroundings, Serac was overcome by the strangest sense of déjà vu. When she'd 'left' the world of Night, she'd been on the riverbank right next to a wide, rushing Sanzu. That was exactly where she was now, except 'here', the water was of a pleasantly subtle gold, almost like diluted honey.

The whole place also had a more lived-in look, for lack of a better word. The trees here had been shaved back to give room for the road of packed earth, wide enough for a Mriga man and his two deer familiars to walk side by side. Yet, even as Serac followed Travertine along the contours of the riverbank, she couldn't help but 'see' and 'feel' the overlap with the untamed Night woods. This is so, um, trippy, Trippy.

"You don't know the half of it, Serac. Imagine if the crossing had happened in the middle of a bustling city."

Serac did, and reacted with an odd half-shudder. She was both horrified and fascinated by the idea of an city that was somehow two-cities-in-one-but-not-really.

The déjà vu didn't stop there. For Travertine soon led her to another boat, much cleaner and spiffier than Oriole's but moored to almost the exact 'same' spot. It was mostly wooden in make where Oriole's had been of rusted, crumbling metal. What both had in common, however, was a hefty smokestack that rose above the cabin, as tall and prominent as a deer's antlers.

"Now," Travertine spoke again as he climbed onto the boat (the deer hopped on after him!), "we can't wander into town with you looking like that. I shall wait in the cabin while you wash yourself and your clothes of all that blood and muck. Worry not, as I've clean clothing that will fit you just fine."

"Wash myself?" Serac repeated, nonplussed. "But… how?"

Travertine looked at her like she'd broken out in cat fur.

"Is this some Narakite joke I'm not privy to? You're standing right next to a river, are you not?"

Serac gasped, scandalized. A fresh sense of déjà vu (she seemed to recall a somewhat similar conversation from one Realm below) was pushed aside by alarm.

"You want me to wash here?" she yelped, sweeping her across all the open space around her.

"Where else?" Travertine answered evenly. "And be quick about it. We haven't got all Day."

The Mriga then ducked into the cabin before Serac could get another word in. She was left alone with the deer. DLEE blinked at her with innocent doe eyes while ORD bristled and brooded on his own.

Nope, Serac said to herself. Uh uh. There's no way I'm dipping into this river in broad daylight, and on the recommendation of a deer man I barely know!

"Careful, Serac." An instant retort from her voice of reason—or was it madness in this case? "Remember what happened the last time you outright refused a local Wayfarer's instruction?"

How could she forget? She'd only just lived the nightmare a mere few minutes ago. Of all the [Oaths] she could've registered, oh, why did she have to pick one with so many potential pitfalls?

Grumbling, muttering, and deeply unhappy with herself, Serac said 'fine, if you must' to life's thrills and spills. She first trekked a little ways downstream to be out of sight of the boat, then waded into the honey-colored Sanzu, growing hotter with every step despite the cool water.

Contrary to Serac's misgivings, the bath turned out to be really quite refreshing. The water was bracingly brisk—a nice contrast to her memories of Nokken-hunting in the Rotgardian winter. It had an unexpectedly gritty feel to it, like it was filled with some invisible sand. The added texture only helped to excoriate and reinvigorate her travel-worn skin, even more effectively than the hot spring at the Wayside Lotus. Don't know what I was worried about. This is definitely one for the 'thrills' column.

Mood considerably improved, she made her way back to the boat with dripping laundry in tow. She was impressed again to see Travertine had already set down a fresh change of clothes on the deck, while the man himself remained out of sight.

Serac hastily changed into her Tidereigner attire, consisting of a collared blouse, riding breeches, knee-high boots, and a hooded overcoat to finish the look. Every item fit her perfectly, as her Mriga host had promised. She rather liked the fashion, markedly different from anything she'd seen in the lower Realms. Still, she preferred to wear her hood down and let her stumps breathe.

She also made sure to tuck Oriole's letter into the overcoat's ample pocket. The letter had—as the Tiryaga had also promised—made the trip with her, fully intact. The exact circumstances of said trip still rankled her, but now that she'd 'agreed' to the job, she'd do her darnedest to see it through.

"Are you decent?" Travertine asked from inside the cabin, then strode onto the deck without waiting for a response. He gave the Rakshasa's new outfit a onceover, then added with a scowl, "Put the hood up. It's there for a reason."

Maybe it was the tone of his voice, but Serac instantly wanted to refuse. Again. She then remembered her [Oath] and did as she was asked, not bothering to hide her reluctance.

I'm really starting to regret this stupid [Oath]. At the time when I came up with it, I thought it was so perfectly 'me'. But more and more, I'm seeing all the ways it could very much be anti-Serac-Edin.

"Good," Travertine said without so much as a flicker in his scowl, "we shall depart."

The boat, as its appearance suggested, was steam-powered. Great puffs of black smoke rose into the sky, a rather jarring stain upon a sepia-toned dreamscape. Ruined aesthetics notwithstanding, Travertine's steamboat puffed its way upstream at a decent clip.

"What's with all the secrecy?" Serac thought to ask as the novelty of steam-powered transportation wore off.

"To what do you refer?" Travertine asked. The man stood at the bow of the deck, slitted eyes pointed strictly forward.

"You said I shouldn't tell people about my crossing over from the side of Night. And now you want me to wear this hood to… what? Cover up the fact I'm a Rakshasa? I mean, why do your clothes have hoods anyway? Aren't they kind of pointless with… you know, your—?"

"Antlers can be shed and regrown, so no, hoods aren't pointless." If the deer man was annoyed by the outrealmer's ignorance, he didn't show it. "And to answer your first question… as I've said, it's for your own good, as well as the good of Tidereigners at large."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning the arrival of an outrealmer in our midst, especially one of your… status"—Travertine's eyes flashed briefly with a Pathsighted gleam—"will undoubtedly be a shock to a finely tuned system. That's not necessarily an ill thing in itself, but until you get your bearings, and until the people of Tidereign are ready to adjust to the new reality, it's best you keep a low profile. With that hood on, and as long as you don't draw attention to yourself, most passersby would assume you're a shedding doe with a bad case of the mange."

About an hour into their meeting now, Serac still had no idea what to make of this Travertine character. He saved me from permanent Frenzy, he's continued to be helpful, and I can talk myself into believing he's just looking out for me. But some of the stuff he says… is just so off.

"Uh, thanks for these clothes, by the way." She tried a different, hopefully less thorny tack. "I'm surprised they fit me so well." That was when a new thought occurred, utterly derailing her original plan of friendly small talk. "Um, may I ask why? Why do you have clothes in the cabin of your boat that, uh, fit women of a certain size?"

"Not just your size," Travertine answered promptly and evenly, making no attempt at deflection or secrecy, "and not just women. I have a collection of secondhand clothing and other personal items. It's only natural in my line of work."

Serac's pulse quickened, her pupils dilated, and she felt cold sweat trickle down her spine. What the hell are we even talking about? Do I need to jump off this boat right this Ksana? Just my luck for my second introduction to Tidereign to be this homicidal maniac!

"Uhhh," Serac tried again, desperate for anything to help her feel normal again, "and what line of work might that be? Oh yeah, you mentioned you needed help with a tricky job or some such?"

At this, Travertine turned and settled his gaze. Serac tried and failed to stifle another gasp. For the man's expression had flipped all the way into a vicious grin. Its effect was orders of magnitude more disturbing than any of his scowls or peculiar words.

"I bid you thank the Keeper for this blessed Day, you who bear the name Upheaver," he said in a deep, bone-rattling baritone, "for you shall join me in my sacred mission to protect the herd. ToDay, you're going to help me catch—nay, hunt—a serial killer."

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